Zhu Shoucheng, who was on the bed, reacted, with a ragged, hoarse breathing sound from his throat, like a pig with its hooves tied and unable to move.
Chi Xiaochi stared at him: "Mr. Zhu, why didn't you tell the police that I beat him? Didn't you see me?"
Zhu Shoucheng slanted his two slit-like blue-yellow eyes from the bandage, and his breathing became rapid.
"Ah, I forgot, there is no surveillance in that area, you can't prove that I beat you." Chi Xiaochi snorted regretfully, "What a pity, if you go and sue me, I will be able to show you this recording. The police, and this…”
Chi Xiaochi took out a photo that had been washed and shook it lightly in front of him.
The photo also smelled of fresh developer water.
Zhu Shoucheng cried out, "Ah", both painful and anxious, but Chi Xiaochi had already taken back the photo and tapped lightly against the palm of his hand: "Respected teacher, who molested students in the alley late at night, such news, Probably more gossip than a good student breaking into a house and falling to his death, don't you think?"
Zhu Shoucheng was in a hurry, his body trembled slightly, and waves of blood rushed towards the severely damaged brain, making him dizzy: "Ah-ah..."
Chi Xiaochi got close to the hospital bed and shoved all the worst information into his head: "What did you say? Teacher, speak louder, I can't hear you. ... Where do you want me to post the photo? It's the school gate. bulletin board, or send it to all your colleagues' mobile phones, or do I make thousands of flyers and distribute them to parents at the gate of your school? Let them see how your dying cow is going to eat the tender grass ?"
After speaking, he put the photo back in the middle of the schoolbag, and after putting it away properly, he turned his face: "How do these two things come in handy, I have to think about it. Don't worry, before you get well, I'll keep it for you. How to use it, I'd love to hear your opinion later."
When the last words were spoken, Zhu Shoucheng's son came in with a large cup of hot water.
Chi Xiaochi naturally changed the subject: "Mr. Zhu, you have a good rest and get well soon. I will visit you often."
He stood up, faced Zhu Shoucheng's son, and said with a smile, "Uncle, then I'll go first."
Zhu Shoucheng's son's knowledge of the previous "burglary" case was limited to his father's dictation, and it was impossible for Zhu Shoucheng to tell his son his rhetoric to the police, lest he would go to question Chi Xiaochi and expose himself instead. His impression of Chi Xiaochi was quite good: "Excuse me, and bring something. But my dad is seriously injured now. The doctor said that he can only eat liquid food. You should take this apple back so that it won't break..."
Chi Xiaochi didn't refuse, and reached into the net pocket: "Uncle, let me take one. The rest can be made into apple juice and eaten with liquid food. Apples are good for people's health, let Teacher Zhu eat more. , can live a hundred years."
Such a sentence made Zhu Shoucheng on the bed sweat all over with anxiety. He only suspected that the apple was poisonous, but he was speechless. He was afraid that his son would go to the police station to report the case, and the recording and photos would be exposed together. There was a pounding of garlic in my head.
And such a sweet mouth made Zhu Shoucheng's son's impression of the child a little better.
He sent Chi Xiaochi out the door and told Chi Xiaochi that he was very busy with work. If the old father insisted on staying here, he would ask a nanny to take care of him. At that time, Chi Xiaochi was also asked to walk around the house and take care of his father's body for him.
Chi Xiaochi smiled sincerely: "Definitely."
Watching Zhu Shoucheng's son return to the ward, Chi Xiaochi went to the nurse station.
In the nurse's station, the apple-faced nurse who just showed him the way is still there.
Chi Xiaochi's smile was bright and dazzling: "Nurse sister, thank you."
"You're welcome." Everyone likes polite and good-looking boys, and the apple-faced nurse is no exception. She leaned forward on her arm and asked him, "So can he show you your homework?"
Chi Xiaochi scratched the back of his head embarrassedly: "I didn't expect Teacher Zhu to be hurt so badly."
"Why am I lying to you?" The little nurse shook her head. "He was so injured that his head was so swollen that he couldn't see anything clearly. You said you wanted to show him his homework. Don't say anything, the boss is a living person. Wandering in front of him, he may not see clearly..."
While chatting, the emergency pager on the wall suddenly rang.
The little nurse immediately stopped chatting.
On the other end of the pager was the anxious voice of Zhu Shoucheng's son: "Someone! Come on! My dad's condition is not good!"
The little nurse got up in a hurry and went to check the situation.
And Chi Xiaochi also turned around with a smile on his face, and passed by the doctors and nurses who were running towards him.
He held up the apple and took a light bite.
The graininess of the apple skin and the fresh and sweet aroma of the pulp bloom layer by layer between Chi Xiaochi's lips and tongue.
Chi Xiaochi knows everything.
After cleaning up the blood on the iron rod, he used a lighter to bake the surface of the iron rod from end to end, went to the garbage station in the suburbs, and threw it into a pile of garbage.
He has checked the information, and the recording cannot be used as direct evidence to prove the crime of the person.
Last night, he listened to the recording over and over again and again, and confirmed that except for the whimpering of the little boy who was suspected to be covering his mouth and nose, everything Zhu Shoucheng said could be explained by "borrowing gloves from the students".
That Chi Xiaochi didn't give him any chance to explain to the outside world.
Since he could not conclusively prove his crime even if he took out the recording, he would have to create a prison by himself and keep Zhu Shoucheng in it.
He wants Zhu Shoucheng to rot this matter in his stomach, rot into a cavity of bitterness, rot into poison, and can only store it until he poisons himself.
In order to stop Zhu Shoucheng's mouth, Chi Xiaochi also needed something more powerful than the recording to grab the old fox's neck.
Therefore, he went to the nurse to ask if Zhu Shoucheng, who had just escaped from danger, could see clearly.
After getting a negative answer, what he has prepared can come in handy.
Sitting in the small garden of the hospital, Chi Xiaochi took out the so-called "photograph" from his schoolbag.
The situation was critical, and he simply had no tools to shoot.
So he brought a photo that he treasured, and borrowed a little bit of developer solution, painted it on the back of the photo, and deliberately created a puzzle for Zhu Shoucheng.
In this puzzle, there is not even a single person, it is a white snow field.
Above the snow, there were two figures of people holding hands.
At that time, Lou Ying and Chi Xiaochi were one thirteen and one eleven.
On a snowy day, they came out to play and had snowball fights with other children in the Tongzilou.
Together, the two are invincible.
After winning, Chi Xiaochi, who was covered in snow, ran close to Lou Ying's call and squatted down obediently, while Lou Ying brushed the large snowflakes off his head to prevent the snow from melting into his hair.
Chi Xiaochi looked up at him for a long time and called him softly, "Brother."
Lou Ying said intently, "Huh?"
Chi Xiaochi said, "Brother, I want to roll in the snow with you."
Lou Ying stopped his hand, and said helplessly and funny: "Children's words. It's not that I haven't seen snow before."
Chi Xiaochi is a rogue: "I want it."
Lou Ying thought for a while: "Okay, I'll listen to the reason."
Chi Xiaochi's head was full of fantastic and romantic thoughts: "If we were two pandas, wouldn't it be very happy to roll from one end to the other in the snow together?"
Lou Ying: "Okay, you will play the panda. I am a breeder who specializes in feeding pandas."
Chi Xiaochi said confidently, "No, I'm the only panda, how stupid."
In the end, the breeder compromised and promised to be a giant panda who would be foolish with the red panda.
Behind the bungalow, there is a large piece of untouched and flat snow, which is knee-deep, enough for two people to toss for a while.
As a result, Chi Xiaochi turned a little over himself, and felt a little embarrassed. He turned over from the snow and got up: "It seems really stupid."
Lou Ying also turned over from the snow and wiped off the snow foam on his mouth: "Stupid."
Chi Xiaochi looked at him, haha, and he was so happy.
Lou Ying was a little resentful: "You still laugh at me, do you know what I look like?"
Chi Xiaochi shook his head quickly as if shaking his hair, and shook off a large piece of the snow on his head and face: "I don't know, I don't know."
Lou Ying got up, went home, took a repaired second-hand camera, pointed at the two panda prints on the snow holding hands, and took a picture.
Chi Xiaochi was curious: "What is this for?"
Lou Ying replied with a smile: "As a souvenir for the two pandas."
Chi Xiaochi walked out of the hospital, did not go back to school, but went home and returned to the place where Lou Ying fell from the building.
In the winter of a few years ago, they held hands and branded two human figures in the snow.
In the not-too-distant summer, his body fell to the ground, leaving a pool of dark red blood on the ground and a human figure made of tape.
But now, Chi Xiaochi staggered to the ground covered with a thin layer of snow, and fell on his back.
The snow seeped through the clothes on his back, and he lifted the photo he had been holding in his hand and pressed it against his feverish cheek, blocking the light from his face.
Behind the photo is Lou Ying's inscription after printing out the photo.
"On XX, XX, the giant panda was printed here."
Now, there is only one lonely panda left, missing the other.
Chi Xiaochi put the photo into his heart, and at the same time made a plan.
He wants to make full use of the recording and this "non-existent" photo to convince the surnamed Zhu.
Chi Xiaochi wouldn't use these things to report the crime. He wanted to keep torturing Zhu Shoucheng, so that he would learn what fear is, so that he would be immersed in the fear of being exposed at any time, and life would be better than death.
He will still carry weapons with him. If Zhu Shoucheng dares to violently snatch or burglary, he will kill him with his own hands. Then he will refer to what he did to Lou Ying, publish the recording, and put all the charges on him. .
However, things don't always go as expected.
Within a day after Chi Xiaochi left the hospital, the hospital issued two critical illness notices to Zhu Shoucheng.
On the third day, Chi Xiaochi received a notice.
Zhu Shoucheng is dead.
Maybe he was beaten to death, maybe he was scared to death.
… who knows.
The police station had no clue about this vicious attack.
They couldn't find the murder weapon, and the footprints were completely covered with snow. The little boy who often went home with Zhu Shoucheng recently had no idea about the police's questions. His mother was also very strong and bluntly said that it was not about my children, even the victim himself. Nor was he able to provide valid testimony before his death.
Considering the motive, Lao Dai called Chi Xiaochi, who had accused Zhu Shoucheng of sexual assault, to inquire.
But Chi Xiaochi, who had been trained by Lao Dai himself, had learned to use "I don't know" flexibly to answer all questions, and there was a hint of surprise in his calm attitude, so that Lao Dai couldn't pick a single mistake.
In the end, it was Ziyu who really helped Chi Xiaochi to get out of his guilt.
Ziyu said that on the day of the incident, she met Chi Xiaochi on the road after school, and took him back to her single dormitory, where she cooked dumplings for him.
The local low-level case-solving ability helped Zhu Shoucheng to get out of the crime, and also helped Chi Xiaochi.
After Ziyu took Chi Xiaochi out of the police station, she didn't say a word to him.
Since then, she has never seen Chi Xiaochi again, and even if she occasionally meets him on the road, Ziyu pretends not to see him.
… The two are so unfamiliar that they are like two Piaoping who only meet each other.
One day after leaving the police station, when school was over, Chi Xiaochi was stopped by a woman.
She reported herself: "I am the mother of ancient and modern."
Gu Jin is the name of the little boy saved by Chi Xiaochi that day.
She took Chi Xiaochi to the best local restaurant and asked him to order whatever he wanted.
"Gu Jin was timid. He went home that day and told me everything." When the woman talked about this, she had a happy face, "The old thing died well."
"Child, don't worry. I told Gu Jin to completely forget about that incident. In front of the police, no matter what they ask, they say they don't know. Since you saved him, we can't be without conscience."
Chi Xiaochi smiled, took a chopstick and stuffed it into his mouth.
Cai followed the empty heart and fell into the bottomless abyss.
Revenge is indeed a joyous thing. The only thing that is hard to resist is that after revenge, the heart is suddenly pulled away from it, and the emptiness is completely dazed.
Zhu Shoucheng died too quickly, and after his life evaporated, a huge and hideous hole appeared in Chi Xiaochi's heart.
This void appeared the moment Lou Ying fell.
… very painful.
It was so painful that he couldn't cry.
The guilt unique to those who survived the great disaster filled Chi Xiaochi.
Every day when he opened his eyes, he was thinking, why am I alive.
Why did Lou Ying fall down the stairs that day
What if instead of asking for help, he went to help Lou Ying
What if he didn't go to Zhu Shoucheng's house for tutoring
…
Countless questions woven a seamless dense web, turned into invisible air, and wrapped him tightly.
Gradually, opening your eyes every morning has become something that requires courage.
It's so painful, so tired.
Is living such a sin
Just like planning Zhu Shoucheng's death, Chi Xiaochi began to plan his own death seriously.
He can't die at school.
Chi Xiaochi didn't hate this school. If he jumped from the teaching building or cut his wrists in the school toilet, with what he knew about his parents, he would definitely make a claim to the school.
He also didn't want to die at home. He no longer has such a strong love and hatred for his parents, and home has no meaning to him. It is not a place of hatred, nor is it a place of peace of mind worthy of being a home.
In other places, it is also very bad to depreciate where you jump.
Later, he chose a bridge.
Jumping down from the bridge, falling into the water, and being carried away by the water, it should be a good home.
In the next monthly test, Chi Xiaochi took the first place.
No one could see his mood.
In the eyes of his classmates, he was no different from usual.
Someone shouted: "University tyrant, please eat."
Chi Xiaochi smiled and said, "Definitely."
He really invited his best friends to dinner. In order to avoid leaving them with a psychological shadow, Chi Xiaochi deliberately delayed for several days before climbing on the bridge that he had been watching for a long time in the middle of the night when no one was there.
In the dark night, no water can be seen, only the murmur of water can be heard.
Chi Xiaochi imagined that the river would take him to the nearest river, and he went downstream, leaving this suffocating place, surrounded by waves, like a rolling red panda, rolling on and off. , rolled all the way to the person he wanted to see, then lay down at his feet, hugged his trousers, and never left.
… too tired.
Thinking that it wouldn't be so difficult to get up tomorrow morning, Chi Xiaochi rejoiced from the bottom of his heart.
He left a suicide note on himself and jumped into the rolling waves.
His suicide note has only six words.
"I've been here. I'm abstaining."
…
The resonant string of time has undergone subtle changes here.
This is the story of Chi Xiaochi in the parallel world. Chi Xiaochi has experienced it all, exactly.
He smashed Zhu Shoucheng's head on that snowy night, frightened Zhu Shoucheng to death in the hospital, and that night, he quietly sat on the guardrail beside the bridge.
The only difference is that he didn't jump.
Just because the original Chi Xiaochi suddenly remembered something.
… What happens when no one feeds the dog meat.
It has bad eyes, doesn't know that it is dead, will it turn around looking for him
Will he be given rat medicine because he yelled too loudly
From this, he thought of more.
Chi Xiaochi thought of Lou Ying's room, thinking that if he died, the house would be emptied and filled with baby supplies.
Besides him, who else can really remember Lou Ying and never forget him in his life.
Chi Xiaochi looked at the darkness on the soles of his feet, raised his legs, and turned back from the outer railing.
He walked back home slowly, sleepwalking in the city little by little, and finally came to the Beimang Cemetery.
Chi Xiaochi clumsily climbed over the iron fence, found Lou Ying's tombstone, and leaned on it with peace of mind.
He brushed the tombstone lightly with the back of his hand, thinking, it's good that Brother Lou can't see me like this.
In his mind, he will always be that willful, innocent, childish younger brother, not a murderer full of calculations and bloody hands.
so good.
…
After reading this world line that was almost identical to everything in his memory, Chi Xiaochi put down the wine glass.
This body is still young and can't stand the stimulation of foreign wine.
… He was a little drunk.
So when a man stood in front of him panting slightly, Chi Xiaochi's nerves paralyzed by alcohol failed to make him respond properly.
He raised his head and showed a smile: "You're here..."
The person who came couldn't help but say it, and hugged him directly into his arms.
Chi Xiaochi was stunned when he was hugged.
The physical contact made him resist a little instinctively, but the familiar smell and body temperature made him unconsciously lose his strength.
Chi Xiaochi leaned softly into the man's arms. Just as he was about to speak, when he raised his eyes, he saw a familiar figure at the gate of the public school on the opposite side—
Zhu Shoucheng walked out of the school with a short boy in the second year of junior high school chatting and laughing.
He looked into the boy's eyes, filled with a disgusting, strange light.